Friday, June 24, 2011

Duct tape... What is it good for really?

So other than making wallets, or boots for cats, what is duct tape really good for? It doesn't stick to anything, dries up and is basically useless for duct work... What brought this on? We had a hvac guy come in and give us a quote on what it would take to fix the geriatric ac unit in our attic.

The ducts are made out of insulation, which I thought was weird, so they are soft, and all disconnected everywhere. Anyways the quote was for 3500 to just raise the unit, replace the ducts and drop two new ducts into the basement so that we can get some ac down there. Right now we are losing at least half of the ac into the attic because the ducks are all broken.

Ok well I don't have 3500, if I did I would fix the pool first because I can't get insurance until that is fixed..and the fence, and the shed..sigh... So off to home depot. I'm a DIY expert right, how had can duct work be? You buy a dozen rolls of duct tape and your good! Only I know better, sorry to all you duct tape enthusiast out there, but it's crap. It's certainly not what you use for ducts, for that you use the shinny metal tape that sticks to it's self as if it were the same piece of tape..

I pick up 10 6" diameter pipes, 8 90 degree elbows, a dozen or so clamps, and a roll of the metallic tape to prepare for battle tomorrow. The attic is on average 20 degrees hotter than the outside due to the roof being black, and almost no air circulation. Ok granted when the ac kicks in there is some nice cool air moving around up there at present, but it's still damn hot, I'm really hoping it won't be hot tomorrow when I try and do this.

Edit: ok so it's 1am and I just finished the duct work... Yah I know, but I thought, hey it's probably cold up there right now at about 11:30, and I was right, it was about as cold as the inside of the house. I dragged most of the components up stairs and got to work, starting with the ducts in the mbr (one of them doesn't put out any air at all) I patched them up with the tape, reconnected the ducts that have fallen apart so that they are sturdy again.

While I am a pretty good diy'er I'm a crappy blogger because I forgot to take before pictures, but I will post some after ones below so you can see some of the funny crap I had to do. Anyways when I am finished I set the ac to 68 and check all the ducts, low and behod they are all belting out cold air and the temperature in the house is dropping by one degree every 10 minutes. Success! Of course, Jenn is not impressed because it's 1:30 and instead of letting her sleep I am talking to you guys...

1 comment:

  1. Good job on the A/C! Sounds like your electrical stuff is going to be a problem though, in spite of the fact that they put in a new panel.

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